Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

Neuroendocrinology

Electromagnetic control of neural activity — prospective physics for physicians

Rapid, minimally invasive control of explicit neural activity would be a major advance for basic and clinical research in the neuroscience and neuroendocrinology fields, and could have applications for the potential treatment of neurological disorders. A new study by Stanley et al. brings us closer to this goal.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

References

  1. King, B. M. The rise, fall, and resurrection of the ventromedial hypothalamus in the regulation of feeding behavior and body weight. Physiol. Behav. 87, 221–244 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Stanley, S. A. et al. Bidirectional electromagnetic control of the hypothalamus regulates feeding and metabolism. Nature 531, 647–650 (2016).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Stanley, S. A. et al. Radio-wave heating of iron oxide nanoparticles can regulate plasma glucose in mice. Science 336, 604–608 (2012).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Stanley, S. A., Sauer, J., Kane, R. S., Dordick, J. S. & Friedman, J. M. Remote regulation of glucose homeostasis in mice using genetically encoded nanoparticles. Nat. Med. 21, 92–98 (2015).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Krashes, M. J. et al. Rapid, reversible activation of AgRP neurons drives feeding behavior in mice. J. Clin. Invest. 121, 1424–1428 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Stanley, S. et al. Profiling of glucose-sensing neurons reveals that GHRH neurons are activated by hypoglycemia. Cell. Metab. 18, 596–607 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Wheeler, M. A. et al. Genetically targeted magnetic control of the nervous system. Nat. Neurosci. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nn.4265, (2016).

  8. Kim, T. I. et al. Injectable, cellular-scale optoelectronics with applications for wireless optogenetics. Science 340, 211–216 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Lin, J. Y., Knutsen, P. M., Muller, A., Kleinfeld, D. & Tsien, R. Y. ReaChR: a red-shifted variant of channelrhodopsin enables deep transcranial optogenetic excitation. Nat. Neurosci. 16, 1499–1508 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Vardy, E. et al. A new DREADD facilitates the multiplexed chemogenetic interrogation of behavior. Neuron 86, 936–946 (2015).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michael J. Krashes.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Funderburk, S., Krashes, M. Electromagnetic control of neural activity — prospective physics for physicians. Nat Rev Endocrinol 12, 316–317 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrendo.2016.65

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrendo.2016.65

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing